Definition
老汉 literally means 'old man' and is used as a noun to refer to an elderly male. It also has a distinctive self-referential use where an elderly man refers to himself as 老汉 — a humble, slightly informal first-person pronoun equivalent to 'I' or 'this old man' in English. This usage is common in northern Chinese dialects and literary or colloquial speech.
n.
old man(self-reference, used by an elderly man) Ithis old man
Examples
- 老汉。lǎo hàn zài gōngyuán lǐ sànbù.The old man is walking in the park.
- 老汉，。lǎo hàn jīnnián bāshí duō le, shēntǐ hái xíng.I'm over eighty this year, still in decent health.
- 老汉。Cūn lǐ nà wèi lǎo hàn shì ge lǎo zhōngyī.That old man in the village is an old-school Chinese doctor.
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